A Look at the Four Developers Who Responded to Mangano’s RFQ

August 3rd, 201212:27 pm

Kevin Schultz

Thanks to Newsday’s Randi Marshall, we now have the names of four developers who have submitted RFQs to the County for development of the Coliseum property (and you should really follow her on Twitter if you want to keep up with this sort of news). I’m going to preface all this with the following; that this doesn’t mean things are any closer to getting a new Coliseum built. Not only that, but the developers have not been asked even to submit plans yet. It’s essentially a show of hands for who wants to kick tires on this political football that’s on its last bit of air. Another key point here is that this process hasn’t involved the Islanders yet, another important step before we really have an idea of how this impacts the team. Nonetheless, here are the details on the four developers who submitted RFQs to the County:

Donald Monti CEO of Renaissance Downtowns
Monti’s Plainview based company Renaissance Downtowns is probably the most promising candidate in the field for keeping the Islanders on the Coliseum property in that he’s the only one of these four developers who has specifically said that he wants to help retain the Islanders. Renaissance has redeveloped many downtown areas in the northeast, most recently in Glen Cove with the Glen Isle Project. That project has an interesting connection as Monti’s group worked with Rexcorp Realty, Scott Rechler’s real estate company. Rechler was Charles Wang’s former partner on the Lighthouse Project. How this would affect the Islanders and Wang positively or negatively remains to be seen.

One further note here is that despite the similarities of the two companies the rumors that Wang’s Plainview based Renaissance Property Associates is related to Monti’s Renaissance Downtowns are so far unfounded. A spokesman for Renaissance Downtowns confirmed to IPB that “there is no relationship between the two entities – but certainly a notable coincidence.”

On the subject of the Islanders Blumenfeld has been mum recently but the ABLI has been staunchly against Wang and the team. The ABLI was behind the anti-referendum campaign last summer (a statement that will be reiterated on this blog until the end of time) and Executive Director Desmond Ryan wrote an editorial bashing Wang in the LI Business News last week.

Wilbur Breslin famously tried to build an enormous mall and housing development in Yaphank that critics dubbed “Willy World.” After decades of trying to build it, that plan eventually fell through. If there’s one developer who can think big it’s Breslin, but we already saw one enormous development project fall through in Nassau.

Breslin’s website boasts pictures of numerous developments around the Island, most of large scale strip malls that you may recognize from around the Island, including Republic Plaza next to the airport in Farmingdale.

This Suffolk based firm is more local than the other two, their online portfolio showing structures only built on Long Island. They’ve developed MacArthur airport and office buildings along Motor Parkway and Old Country Road. According to Marshall, the developer says they are only interested in developing 30 acres of the property. Not only is it hard to imagine the Islanders factoring into those plans but if the County intends on developing the entire property, this would be a far less than an ideal solution.